Has anyone ever tried to run 2 Delta cards? I have a Delta 1010 that's been solid forever. No latency issues and all the I/Os I need. I've also recently started using my Korg Es1 for drums again. I just love inputting drums in a step sequenced format. The es1 is capable of sending its notes to Ableton's drum rack, no problem. The only issue by doing this is that it eats up both my Midi In and Out just for this.

Here's my proposed solution. I would just like other's experiences before I unplug my entire computer setup and open it up. Can I insert another Delta card (I have a smaller crappier one, but with Midi) and use it tandem with the 1010? This way the Es1 could use it's midi just for drum editing, and I'd be free to use my master controller for the synths with the 1010.

I don't know specifically about the Delta series cards - its vaguely possible they'd have a driver that doesn't support it but it would have to be written specifically not to (and why would they do that?!) - but I've been running multiple soundcards in my systems since the DOS days. My main workstation PC has an SB Live 5.1 with MPU-401, a USB MIDI dongle and the onboard (laptop) sound card running in tandem.

What platform are you on? OSX supports 'aggregate' audio devices natively so I'd imagine there would be no problem there. On Linux, programs let you pick which sound device to output to or you can set a 'system default' (e.g. in the Alsa mixer options.) Windows is similar.

You won't damage anything if you stick the card in and there's a conflict or it doesn't work for some reason, just try it.

meatballfulton wrote:If you plan on using the second card only for MIDI, then you're not running multiple audio interfaces on Windows so should be no problem.

Windows does support multiple MIDI interfaces.

Windows supports multiple audio interfaces too, it's just occasionally a pain to get programs to use the one you want rather than the first one in the list. But every music related prog I've ever seen has a way to configure it properly.

Windows does indeed support multiple audio interfaces, assuming that the drivers allow such. Some manufacturers allow the devices to aggregate themselves within the driver, i.e. 2x 8 in 2 out interfaces become a 16 in 4 out. Yes, I know that a Mac can do this all by itself.